Under the Shadow of the Clock Tower
by The Carnivorous Muffin
Summary: Link wanders through worlds, times, life, and death to appear in a train station where Death offers him tea and conversation. Side fic to "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus"
**Author's Note: A few warnings. One, this is a crossover based on the fic "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" and specifically the Legend of Zelda games "Ocarina of Time" and "Majora's Mask" if you haven't read a decent way into the fic or don't know the plot of the games, you'll be extremely confused about what's going on. The other warning is that because of that this is NOT CANON to the Lily verse.**

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A meeting between old gods who like to wear the faces of men as trees in the deep forests of Kokiri like to wear the faces of elfin children.

One is dressed as a child, wearing distinctive forest green, pointed Hylian ears, hair the color of wheat in struck by the summer sunlight, and dark blue eyes. The other is in black and white sparing only green for his eyes with feathers for hair.

The boy wanders into the train station between worlds from some point in the distance, his eyes trained ahead, empty of everything except the goal to take one more step forward. In his pack his painted collection of faces clatter against one another (the deku, the goran, the zora, and the fierce diety each as real as the boyish face he chooses to wear now), but they are safely hidden by a sword that he will grow into in seven years' time, as well as a great Hylian shield.

The man in black, Death as he tends to call himself, watches for a moment wordlessly as if he is little more than a raven in a tree, but then he catches a glimmer of something familiar in the boy's eyes and says, "You seem tired."

The boy turns, silently as if he was born for silence, and simply regards the man waiting for him to finish.

"If you have time to spare and are willing to humor an old man with conversation then I can give you a bit of tea for your trouble."

Again, for a moment, the boy simply stands there with narrowed eyes but then with a cautious slowness he approaches the table where the man is seated and watches as a cup of tea is poured and pushed towards him.

Death regards him, with the casual curiosity that only those who are ageless can have, a patient sort of thing that can wait millennia to be fulfilled, "It's jasmine, not my favorite personally but my… daughter, Lily, is fond of it."

Taking a cautious sip, the boy merely nods, as if in agreement, and his posture relaxes. For several moments they sit in contented silence, as if this was any ordinary train station and both were simply waiting before they embarked, enjoying one last afternoon before leaving trains, stations, and tea far behind.

Thus it's almost startling when the man in black begins talking once again, "What was its name?"

The boy looks up, raised eyebrows, and again without words manages to ask for clarification.

"The world you saw end; did it have a name?"

"…How did you know?" The boy's voice is one that is soft yet somehow cuts, one that forces those to listen for it is used so sparingly, and in it is the echo of the man he has been and will become once again.

For a moment Death pauses, a faint and sorrowful smile on his lips, and slowly he recites, "I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate… I'm sorry, I'm sounding like Lily, she's also very fond of _Blade Runner_."

The boy does not say whether he himself is familiar with Blade Runner or its monologue of tears in the rain.

So instead Death continues, "You have the look of a man who has stood quietly on the edge of existence and watched life flicker then vanish altogether. I wore it myself, once."

"Termina." The boy answers, "But it hasn't ended; I rewrote that."

"And then you left." Death supplies and the boy simply nods, the masks inside his pack practically burning.

"Where do you plan to travel now, if you don't mind my asking?" Because it is clear that while Death is set in his station with his tea that the boy is a wanderer who is forever pushing himself further and further into the infinite horizon.

"Hyrule, my homeland, if possible." The boy says, but there is a ring of falsehood to it because he left Hyrule a long time ago now, before he stretched time thin and ran the labyrinth time's goddess had written for him, "There are people that I would like to see."

This is more or less true but, as always, there are unspoken caveats. Saria will depart for the world of the sages, as will Ruto, the goron king, Impa, and many of those he holds close in the depths of his heart. Those that would be left in the mortal realm, who he might visit, are few and far between.

There is Malon, who wore the name Romani in Termina, but the thought of her forces him to dwell too long on the fate he often left the girl to. Either burning alive at that final midnight or else an empty shell with the very soul drained from her.

And of course, there is always the princess, Zelda.

But there is a part of him which still burns in resentment, at the thought of being sent backward, of looking the naïve child version of the princess prophet that had so innocently condemned Hyrule to its doom in a world that now never was, and it is terrible for him to think this because this Zelda is not that Zelda and now never will be but he can't help himself.

"And if it isn't possible?" Death asks but the boy does not answer, simply sips his tea and lets the still air and sound of clinking glass answer for him.

"Would you consider an alternative path? I can't guarantee that it will take you home but…" Death waves his hand, the physical motion brushing aside everything they've left unsaid, that home is never quite home after you've left it the first time.

"After my universe was destroyed I boarded the train to a different world, but I wasn't really searching for anything, I'd forgotten how to. Lily, I think, saved me. From what I don't know, whatever happens to ideas when they despair and lose touch with everything that makes them human, but she saved me from that." Death smiled fondly, looking past the boy to the train, and past that to whichever entrance Lily used to enter the station.

"She's very young though and while absurdly powerful she's experienced only some of the world's demons. She still believes, in her heart of hearts, in valiant knights who conquer dragons. I don't want her to learn otherwise, I don't want to look at her and see my own eyes staring back." Death breathes out, sighs, and closes his eyes a look of resignation slipping over his timeless features.

"There are too few people who are on her side and none unconditionally. She needs a friend, closer than I'm able to get stuck here like this, someone whose been through what she's going through and know what it means to be forced into the role of a hero. She needs someone to guard her back and more someone who… understands." When the boy doesn't move, doesn't nod, gives no indication of acceptance or rejection Death adds pleadingly, with a human desperation that seems so out of place on his face, "Please. If you are wandering anyway without direction then… Please."

(Don't let her become a being who only wears a mask of humanity out of nostalgia and desperation.)

In the pause before the boy answers is the leering mad grin of the moon, bearing down upon the clock tower with diligence, the sound of clocks running backwards (the goddess of time is looking over you), and the feeling of seven years lost in the blink of an eye.

There is the thought that he is worn thin, that he wears his faces on painted masks, that he doesn't seem to have an age anymore after jumping from boy to man so frequently in a lifetime that no longer happened, that he can't do this anymore.

But there is also what the man in black is implying, that somewhere out there is a girl like him, like he used to be, who has so much potential but has yet to hear her true calling. And there is the thought, that if someone like him, or this man in black had come along when Navi had flown into his window, had joined him on his quest, then perhaps the boy would not be what he is today.

And somehow, without meeting her, he can almost see her bright grin like sunlight and the red fire of her hair. Everything bright, brilliant, and alive as all things of Farore are.

So the boy nods, flinching as the man in black reaches across to hug him, breathing into his ear, "Thank you."

(It is only after this has been resolved, after the new quest has been chosen, that the man introduces himself as Death and the boy as Link the avatar of Courage.)

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 **Author's Note: And that's how Lily gains a new terrifying best friend whose very good at crawling through dungeons, manipulating time, and changing form. Or, that's how you can imagine the rest of this would go, but we'll leave this here and we get a one-shot of Death instead. I also feel like there should be some sort of drinking game for how many times I quote "Blade Runner" or make references to it, because it's starting to rack up throughout my fics.**

 **Takes place after the events of Majora's Mask, presuming Ocarina of Time happened first. Written for the 100th review of "Bright Eyes" by darkflare75 who asked for a crossover of "Lily and the Art of Being Sisyphus" and "The Legend of Zelda"**

 **Thanks for reading, reviews are appreciated.**

 **Disclaimer: I don't own The Legend of Zelda or Harry Potter**


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